Sharon Osbourne accuses Lady Gaga of being a 'bully'

Lady Gaga has found herself in the middle of a spat with Kelly Osbourne and her mother, Sharon.

After Kelly Osbourne made criticisms of Gaga's Little Monsters fanbase in an interview with Fabulous, the singer responded by posting an open letter on her website accusing her of bullying due to her role on the TV show Fashion Police.

Osbourne originally claimed that "Gaga's fans are the worst" and, as Billboard reports, alleged that they had made threatening and insulting remarks about her appearance. However, Gaga responded with a lengthy missive on Littlemonsters.com, stating: "I have empathy for you Kelly, but I feel it culturally important to note that you have chosen a less compassionate path. Your work on E! with the Fashion Police is rooted in criticism, judgement, and rating people's beauty against one another.

"'Appearance' is the most used reason for bullying in the world," she added. "Your show breeds negativity, and over the years has become comedic in nature." She later went on to say: "It used to make me truly sad when I would hear people talk about your weight when you were younger, as I was bullied too. To see you blossoming into a beautiful slender woman who makes fun of others for a living is astounding. Why not help others? Why not defend others who are bullied for their image and share your story?"

Now, however, Gaga's comments have sparked a response from Sharon Osbourne. Writing on her Facebook page, she called Gaga "hypocritical and full of contradictions", and added: "I am calling you a bully because you have 32 million followers hanging on your every word and you are criticizing Kelly in your open letter. Are you so desperate that you needed to make this public?"

In December last year, it was revealed that Lady Gaga will provide free counselling at her future 'Born This Way' tour concerts, with punters at her shows able to go to the BornBrave bus before the gig in order to discuss mental health problems with qualified professionals and "break the stigmas around 'help'".